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Once upon a time I had a bright orange camera, it was protected by a cute brown and white floral Vera Bradley wallet with a little pocket for my extra battery. Then some how, magically, the camera, case, and extra battery disappeared. I searched high and I searched low, I searched in and I searched out, with no trace in sight. Time was ticking and Saturday Studios were quickly approaching so I gave up and bought a new camera, but a case was out of my budget. Here is my solution:

Supplies:

Leather scraps – or fabric scraps

Embroidery floss

A thicker gauge needle

I traced the outline of my camera on the leather scraps, making sure to leave some room around the edges to take in consideration the thickness of the camera. The leather scraps are placed so that the faces that are touching will become the exterior of the case and what is being traced on is the interior.

Since the leather is pretty hefty, I used large bobby pins to hold it in place while I stitched the two pieces together.

I then used the embroidery floss to do a not-so-professional looking stitch around my template. Then I just trimmed the edges down to a little less than a quarter of an inch from the stitching.

Once it was all stitched, I flipped the leather right side out and stretched into the corners. I tried my camera inside and it fit nice and snug, but was difficult to get in and out of. That is where the brown strip of leather comes in.

I just made a few cross stitches at the bottom seam, top edge and stitched the ends together. This allowed for a small pull on each end of the case to help with putting the camera in and taking it out.

Here is an image of how the top strap just moves to the side while taking the camera out or putting it in. The strap also acts as a catch in case the camera tries to slide out on its own because I assume that over time the leather will naturally stretch a bit. This project took me a little over an hour to whip up and is a simple, customizable way to protect your electronics. I am going to leave mine very plain but this project can be personalized in a million ways – different types of fabrics, paints, bleaching, size it down for a phone, size it up for a laptop!

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One of the best ways to save money is by cooking at home, and since this girl is back in school, the budget is tight! When cooking at home, spices are your best friend, but your cabinet’s worst enemy. My spices have completely overtaken an entire shelf of cabinet space and I have been wracking my brain for a solution. Unfortunately I don’t have the space to use magnets and hang them all up in plain sight, or the money to buy a fancy spice rack, so here is the simple solution I came up with.

Supplies:

Box – smaller size, with shallow edges is best

Paint

Sharpie marker

Online shopping is another way to save some dough(as long as you don’t go overboard) because you can find amazing coupon deals and you don’t have to waste gas driving to the store. My most recent purchase came in this box, which is just about the perfect size for my spice collection.

I cut off the top flap and painted the inside of the box white and used some of the gold paint from my last project on the outside. This will take a few coats to cover the natural color of the cardboard. Some other ways you could the cover the box are with patterned paper, fabric, newspaper, magazine images, spray paint, Mod Podge, etc. So go crazy with the personalization!

Here is my disorganized spice cabinet. I have to shuffle them around every time I cook and there is absolutely no rhyme or reason to where they are placed back. What a mess!

While all of my spices don’t fit in the box, the ones I use the most do. This is a huge help because when I go to cook something, I can just take out the entire spice box, rather than running back and forth between the stove and my spice cabinet!

All organized and look at all the space I have now! The stuff that didn’t fit in the box are mainly back-ups that I had purchased because I will be running out of the other one very soon. This quick project can also be just as easily done with a store bought box/basket, tupperware or a serving tray.

So I have this pillowcase that is probably older than me, and it is subsequently the softest thing I own and one day I noticed a small rip in the fabric. I flipped the pillow over and tried to pretend it would mend itself in my dreams. Unfortunately, life doesn’t work like a fairy tale so I threw it in the wash with my sheets and the rip more than quadrupled in size, which equaled minor devastation. I take pride in my ultra-plush bed that would make the “Princess and the Pea” sleep soundly through the night, so I decided to turn my sad, unusable pillowcase into a piece of art.

Supplies:

Poster frame – or any frame

Fabric

Santa brought me a few large frames for Christmas and I hadn’t gotten around to filling them yet, so when the pillowcase ripped beyond repair, I suddenly had something to frame.

First I ripped the seam of the pillow case to open it up wider and give myself more options for layout. They sell seam rippers at any fabric store, but I didn’t have one on hand and just used some nail clippers and they got the job done just as easily.

Then once the pillowcase was just one large piece of fabric, I laid it out on the cardboard backing for the frame and took a peek at the composition. I was pleasantly surprised with the contrast between the white fabric and brown backing, as well as the black frame. Afterward, I just folded the tabs down on each side, making sure to pull the fabric nice and taught in the frame.

Here you can see what the fabric looks like all framed. A bit of simple, modern-style art using something most people would have thrown away or turned into rags.

My office/studio had some blank walls that were begging for some artwork, so this piece got hung up promptly. While my framed piece of fabric has a bit of sentimentality to it, the project could be done with endless other things – wallpaper, patterned fabric, ribbon, material samples, scrapbook paper etc. In just ten minutes I had turned my unhappy accident into a beautiful piece of art!

When I was young, my aunt made my cousin and I a felt advent calendar. It’s almost 20 years old now and I still use it every year. I wanted to make my nephews something special they could look forward to each Christmas as well. So I decided to make a felt advent calendar for them too!

I wound up buying way too much fabric and felt ( A yard of each…I have enough extra to make a blanket). You really don’t need much to do this, but it’s good to have a little extra incase you make any mistakes. I spent about $18 on this project, but you could probably get away with spending much less.

Lay your red felt out and cut it to the desired size. Mine was about 36″ x 15″…but I honestly didn’t measure anything. Cut your christmas fabric a little larger on all sides to make a border with it. Then fold your green fabric in half and cut to make a symmetrical Christmas tree. The tree should take up about half of your red fabric when laid out.

Next is the fun part (and the time consuming part). Come up with 25 different Christmas ornaments for your tree. Make sure you keep your felt tree nearby so you can test and make sure they’ll all fit as you make them.
Don’t forget the star for the top!

Cut 25 little squares big enough to hold your ornaments. I didn’t cut mine to be a specific size, they all are a little different, but I think it looks more fun that way.

Fold over your christmas fabric and glue it to your red fabric for a boarder. If you sew- that would work too. Glue down each pocket as well. When I glued mine down I put scrap felt in each one to puff out the pockets and make sure the ornaments would fit. (You can see the difference in the bottom 2 rows that I started compared to the top 3)

Grab some puff paint and number each pocket. Be sure you put something like paper in each pocket just to make sure the puff paint doesn’t stick through to the felt.

I bought sticky velcro and cut tiny squares of the rougher side. Stick one to the back of each ornament and put them each in a pocket. Each day of December, take out an ornament and place it on the tree.

By December 25th your tree will be all filled up!

I cut a hole on each side of the backer christmas fabric and pushed a dowel through it. I tied a ribbon to the dowel so it can hang on a door!

Happy Holidays from the Two Girls! Hope you all have a very crafty Christmas!

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Christmas season is in full swing and the carols have been playing in my car since Thanksgiving! If you don’t know yet, Christmas is my favorite, but now that I’m not living at home anymore, I have ZERO Christmas decorations(besides an adorable snow globe). I knew I needed to fix this ASAP. Michaels was having a sale on pinecones, I knew my family had some string lights to spare and -get ready for this- Two Girls have their first official sponsors! Janlynn, a craft supplier based out of Chicopee, MA, has offered to send us some project supplies and feature our projects on their Facebook page!

Woo! Look at all the fun things we got! And just in time because I was running very low on embroidery floss and this package was overflowing with all different colors of thread.

And wouldn’t you know it, there was some sparkly Christmas colored thread just aching to be used in this project.

To start, I just tied the tops of the pinecones with gold and red embroidery floss, making a loop at the top.

There ended up being about 50 pinecones in two bags from Michaels.

Here is the step that I would skip if I did the project again, I just wasn’t quite sure where I was going to take it at this point. I had strung all of the loops along one long piece of string. I ended up using the loops and just tying each one to a bulb along the string of 60 lights, so the extra string was unnecessary.

The embroidery floss shimmers in the light and the pinecones cast beautiful shadows.

I had originally planned on hanging the garland in my room, but I knew that sharing the Christmas cheer with my roommates was a better idea, so the garland found its home on our entertainment area.

What’s great about this garland are the many ways it can be customized – paint, glitter, colored lights, no lights, ribbons, etc. and they fit both fall and winter decor. So get into the holiday spirit with an easy project that’s bound to liven up the atmosphere!

I saw a pattern awhile back that stuck with me and I decided to replicate it on some wine glasses over the weekend. So here’s how to do it:

Supplies:

Glassware
Acrylic Paint
A paint brush or pencil
An oven

Dip the end of your paintbrush or pencil into acrylic paint.

On the INSIDE of your glass make dots with your first color.

I chose 3 colors for each wine glass and I like the way each turned out. So I guess I’d recommend 3 or more colors if you are going to replicate this pattern.

Once you’ve finished your glasses, place them in a cold oven. Turn the oven t0 350 and let the glasses stay in there for a half hour. After the half hour is over, turn the oven off and let the glasses sit in there until the oven is cool.

Now enjoy!
I washed the glasses to make sure the paint didn’t come off-and it didn’t! It’s definitely baked on there. With gentle washing, the glasses hold up just fine.

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When we started up this blog, it was honestly just an outlet for us not to feel so lazy. While in art school, we were always working on projects, learning new mediums, and inspiring each other, but post graduation, we really got stuck in a rut. We moved to different states and completely fell off the DIY wagon. This blog was the perfect remedy in helping us regain our creativity, and we love sharing it with all of you!

We were so excited and surprised when the hits and followers of our original Two Girls site kept growing and growing. It made us seriously want to produce more; now not only for ourselves, but for everyone reading our posts and trying our projects. So many other do-it-yourselfers have given us great ideas and suggestions, it’s just been such a great year!

We hope our posts inspire you to create your own projects! You’ll never know what you are capable of until you try, so what are you waiting for?

In honor of our 1 Year Anniversary, we have decided to post 10 of our all-time favorite tutorials.

“This was one of my first projects on Two Girls, and it was a great success! This was one of those ones where I really had no clue how it was going to turn out. I loved the outcome and I actually wore the glitter shoes that weekend and got SO MANY compliments on them by complete strangers. I loved that when people asked me where I got them, I could say, ‘I made them!'” -Emily

“These were the perfect little ornaments that Heather made last Christmas. Such an inexpensive way to decorate your tree- and I know if you are like us (two young girls on a budget), you don’t have the money to go out and spend hundreds of dollars to decorate your tree in your apartment. These ornaments smelled so good too! I loved that you could customize them to be in any shape as well. BUT I think I loved these the most because we all got together for New Years and Heather gifted one to each of our friends. I still have mine hanging in front of a vent in my apartment and I think of Heather every time I look at it.” -Emily

“This was a really popular post on Facebook, Pinterest, and we were also featured on other blogs with this tutorial as well. We even had readers who did the tutorial send us their finished product and we even re-posted one. This was such a great idea because we all know how annoying it is when our headphones get all tangled. AND…it’s super cute.” -Emily

“I almost bought a solar light online…and then I thought I could make that. Which is how most of my projects start. Doing things yourself is not only good for your wallet, and good for your brain, but it’s good for the environment too! Many of our projects are us re-using old things we may have otherwise thrown out. This is perfect if you have an empty jar and are looking for something really different to do with it. ” -Emily

“One of my favorite past-times is stopping at garage sales, finding old furniture with a lot of character and doctoring them up. So I was very excited when I saw this post from Heather. Not only is the original cart amazing to begin with- but Heather really takes this cart and makes it her own. The end result is a must-see, and it is a really inspirational project to get your mind turning and thinking about what you can do to an old piece of furniture in your own house. And that is really our goal, get your brain to start using that Right Side.” -Emily

“I was so excited when I received a text message one day from Liz telling me she had gotten into the crafting spirit that I immediately asked if we could feature her project on the blog, so she sent some pictures my way. The thing that makes this blog so special to me is that we set out to motivate ourselves and ended up inspiring others in the process. Liz’s project was the perfect example of using what you have and putting your own personal touch on it.” -Heather

“This was my first foray into the world of chandeliers and while I had an idea in mind for the outcome, the project really evolved as I problem-solved my way through it. The end result was this stunning centerpiece but, at the time, I had no where to hang it, so it sat on my closet floor for months. I began to feel like I may have wasted my time making this gorgeous but cumbersome light fixture. I kept the faith though, lovingly packing it with all my belongings for my move and just a few weeks ago was able to give it the space and attention it deserved in my new art studio/study.” -Heather

“During her visit to Boston last December, Emily had mentioned to me that she had moved her wine rack into the bathroom and turned it into a towel rack, to which I responded that she was a genius and to put that on the blog! The point was, you don’t necessarily even have to make anything to be creative, just some out-of-the-box thinking is all it takes! And we can’t forget her beautiful window headboard that had all my friends asking me where to get old windows and sparked a window project of my own.” -Heather

“Before this project I had never worked with any of these materials or techniques, but because of the support we’ve gotten from the blog I felt confident enough to dive right in and give it a shot. Even though I only had three days to make these, leaving little room for error, I was exhilarated by the process of trying something new and the outcome was better than I had expected. It’s in those moments that I am grateful for the continued praise and feedback from our readers.” -Heather

“What a better way to wrap up our top ten and celebrate our first year anniversary than with a bubbly toast to all of you! This punch was delish and the sentiment on the dispenser rings true year-round. So celebrate creativity with us, because we could not be happier to have been able to share this wonderful year with you and are even more excited to see what the next year brings. Cheers!” -Heather